The Final Straw Radio

David Easley of Ohio IWOC & Jasper of FOM ****This show carries a heavy content warning for institutionalized violence against incarcerated people, suicide, and issues related to mental wellness//unwellness.****** This week I’m sharing a conversation with David Easley, an imprisoned member of the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee, or IWOC, currently held at Toledo Correctional in Ohio. In response to his organizing around the Nationwide Prison Strike in 2018, he and a few other prisoners were thrown into segregation, have had their mail tampered with and stolen. David has also been transferred between numerous facilities around the state as punishment, losing personal items and his ability to communicate with the outside along the way. We were also joined by Jasper, a supporter of David’s and a participant in the Free Ohio Movement. For the hour, David and Jasper talk about the prison system, the challenges they’ve faced opposing it and ways that folks can get involved. You can write to David at the following address: David Easley A306400 Toledo Correctional Institution 2001 East Central Avenue Toledo, OH 43608 You can also keep up with David via the twitter account @OH4prisoners and on fedbook via the account david.easley.353. He also mentions jpay emails as a preferred means to communicate and can be reached with the above information at jpay.com. The case David mentions litigating can be found as Easley v. Zimmerman pending case: https://dockets.justia.com/docket/ohio/ohndce/3:2018cv02050/246954 David mentions a few other prisoners who have struggled and faced repression for facing down injustice in the Ohio prison system. Keith Lamar, aka Bomani Shakur, is a death row prisoner and author of Condemned. He needs public support to fight his wrongful conviction in relation to the 1993 Lucasville Prison Uprising and to hold the State of Ohio accountable. More on his case can be found at https://www.facebook.com/pg/keithlamarcondemned. Check out our interview with Bomani about his book Condemned at our website. Bomani is set to be executed by the state of Ohio on Nov. 16, 2023. Imam Siddique Abdullah Hasan is another Ohio prisoner facing the death penalty for helping resolve the 1993 Lucasville Uprising. You can hear our interviews with and about Hasan up at our website. Updates on Hasan can be found at LucasvilleAmnesty.org and more about the Free Ohio Movement is up at their website, FreeOhioMovement.org and also their fedbook under the username @FreeOhioMovement. Matt Hinkston (A724969) is another prisoner that was on hunger strike with David Easley. Kristopher Chilton (A558673) is the an IWOC member that David mentions who's working on challenging adult sentencing of minors in OH. Kristopher and Matt are both at Toledo CI, same as David, so can be written there. Central Ohio IWOC has been very helpful in supporting David and other prisoners through this. IWOC is a union of Incarcerated Workers and outside supporters, and their fedbook can be found under the username @OfficialCentralOhioIWOC. Their main site for IWOC is incarceratedworkers.org, where you can find tons of resources and updates on calling campaigns and ways to get involved. https://perilouschronicle.com is a great, recently released tool for tracking prisoner resistance in the so-called U.S. Announcements Sean Swain Transferred to VA We found out a few days ago that Sean has been interstate transferred from Ohio to Virginia. While it’s nice that he’s closer to the radio show, it’s bound to be a very tumultuous move for Sean. VA has a different legal system in it’s prisons, Sean likely has none of the friends from his last 27 years inside the Ohio system present where he’s at, he’ll be facing a whole set of new challenges settling in. I don’t know anything about the specifics of his transfer but we hope to hear from him soon. Write him a letter at his new address (and new prisoner number) if you can: Sean Swain #2015638 Nottoway Correctional Center P.O. Box 488 Burkeville, VA 23922 And keep up on his case at https://SeanSwain.org . ... . .. Playlist pending

ROAR Conference 2019 + Spencer Sunshine on Fascism This week on the show, we feature two segments. First up, an organizer with the Revolutionary Organizing Against Racism, or ROAR Conference shares perspectives on the upcoming conference, May 18 & 19, 2019 on stolen Ohlone land in the so-called Bay Area. More info on ROAR Conference at roar-conference.com Then I spoke with journalist and anti-racist activist Spencer Sunshine about various far right and racist tendencies such as traditionalism and third-positionism, in relation to the current landscape of anti-fascist struggle in Turtle Island and in particular tendencies suspected in relation to the demolition of a building at the Highlander Education and Research Center in New Market, TN at the end of March, 2019. More writings by Spencer can be found at spencersunshine.com, at his fedbook author page or on twitter by searching the username @transform6789. The essay that Spencer mentioned, 40 Ways to Fight Nazis can be found here: https://spencersunshine.com/2018/08/10/40-ways-to-fight-nazis/ Announcements Atlanta Solidarity On Friday, April 12th at 8pm there was a ruckus noise demo outside the Dekalb County Jail where prisoners had been able to get out word of physical violence out of camera-view by guards, black mold conditions and more against the mostly indigent, mostly POC prisoner population in this Atlanta Jail. You can hear an interview with the mother of two prisoners mistreated in that jail who got the word out about conditions on IGD's This Is America #68 from April 12, 2019. At the noise demo, at least two people were arrested and there's a fundraiser up to help cover legal costs. You can find that fundraiser and kick in by visiting atlsolidarity.org Immigrant Solidarity Rally, Asheville Listeners in the Asheville area, on Monday April 15th there’ll be a demonstration in front of the Federal Building at 115 Patton Ave in downtown to mark the year anniversary of the 2018 ICE raids against our communities. The demo will be organized by CIMA, or Companeros Inmigrantes de las Montanas en Accion, and will focus on the continued danger faced by our undocumented loved ones, friends and families. This is also in opposition to HB370 currently in process at the state level that would force collaboration between sheriff departments and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. CIMA urges people to show up in force. Asheville Black Mama Bail Out Benefit Also, on Saturday, April 27th at show o’clock at The Bottle Shop next to Firestorm Books, Blue Ridge ABC will be hosting a benefit for Black Mama Bail Out efforts organized by Southerners On New Ground. The show will feature performances by XOR, Kangarot, Nomadic War Machine and more. Check out the flyer and more up at brabc.blackblogs.org . ... . .. Show playlist.

Chelsea Manning and Grand Jury Resistance This week on The Final Straw, we’re excited to bring you perspectives on resisting Federal Grand Juries in the U.S. In particular, we focus on the situation of imprisoned, former army whistle-blower, Chelsea Manning. Ms. Manning, who was in military prison for releasing information about U.S. war crimes in the Afghanistan and Iraq theaters in 2010, had her sentence commuted by former U.S. President, Barack Obama in 2017. Having refused in 2019 to testify on principal before a grand jury in Virginia, spent 4 weeks in solitary confinement and has just been released to general population under the charge of civil contempt. In the first part of this hour, we’ll hear from El & Eli, two supporters of Chelsea, about the grand jury, Chelsea’s resistance to it, and her incarceration. After that, we hear from two anarchist Grand Jury resistors of the last decade who support Chelsea about their personal experiences standing up to this unjust legal practice. First formerly incarcerated Grand Jury resistor, Jerry Koch, speaks about his experiences of resisting a grand jury for which he was imprisoned and mustered a defense that won his release. Then, Katie Yow speaks of her experience resisting a grand jury beginning in 2017 and her admiration and support for Chelsea. You can hear prior interviews with and about the resistance of Jerry Koch and Katie Yow at https://thefinalstrawradio.noblogs.org. You can find out more about Grand Jury resistance at Katie’s support page, https://ncresiststhegrandjury.com. You can keep up on Chelsea’s case via their twitter handle, @resistschelsea, at their fedbook page called @chelsearesists, on their less-active website https://xychelsea.is. There are beautiful “Resist Grand Juries” t-shirts up at akpress.org that support Chelsea’s legal fundraiser, you can also check out the benefit album that Evan Greer helped make for Chelsea that's being used again for this fundraiser, or just check out the action network fundraiser for her legal defense.   Announcements June 11th, 2019 From june11.org about the international day of solidarity with Marius Mason and long-term anarchist prisoners.:  In the 15 years this tradition has been observed, June 11th has facilitated support and action inspired by imprisoned anarchists — from noise demonstrations outside of jails to letter-writing nights, from fundraisers to arson. Setting aside this day is one way of remembering anarchists who are serving long prison sentences, generating support for them, and inspiring solidarity actions. Because social struggles phase in and out, this day is a way to make sure that our imprisoned comrades are not forgotten. Our lack of memory is partially a result of the techno-alienation of the larger culture we’re fighting against. But it’s also a product of the dynamics of the anarchist space. People become burnt out and the cycle of forgetting continues. June 11th is a way of combating that amnesia, of trying to sustain a long-term memory in the anarchist space. Not only does this generate support for anarchists locked in the state’s prisons, it forces us to look back at what came before. Considering what previous generations did can both inspire us with ideas we’ve forgotten, and help us understand how our current practices came to be. So, this is a call to organize ourselves actions for June 11th, 2019. Get some friends together, remember folks inside, remember our common struggles and engage in making ourselves the resistance we need to reverse this course of ecocide and tyranny. NAASN 2019 May 31-June 2nd, Atlanta, GA The North American Anarchist Studies Network is hosting it’s free, yearly conference in Atlanta. The following text is from their gofundme page at https://www.gofundme.com/help-bring-naasn-2019-to-atlanta-ga: The North American Anarchist Studies Network (NAASN) is a network for the engagement of intellectual work, both within and without institutional walls. The goal of the network is to serve as a means of mutual support for North American anarchists engaged in intellectual work, both theoretical and empirical; to facilitate and promote anarchist studies by bringing together students,academics, independent scholars, and activists from across the United States, Canada, and Mexico; and to provide a space for critical dialogue and reflection on anarchism. This year's NAASN conference, "Emergent Horizons" will be hosted in Atlanta, GA. In keeping with the spirit of mutual aid and accessibility for all, we are asking for donations to help make this conference happen.  Over the past years, NAASN has brought together hundreds of activists, academics, intellectuals, and artists across North America , including: Mexico City, Montreal, San Francisco, New Orleans, Portland, San Juan, and Toronto.  Previous presentations have included grassroots struggles, social and peasant movements, decolonization and Indigenous resurgence, border/imperialism, racism, police violence, torture, surveillance, technology, as well as biography, oral histories, historiography, and anarchist subcultures. More on this year’s gathering is up at https://naasn2019.noblogs.org/. If you attend NAASN, come find The Final Straw table and say hi! . ... . .. Show playlist

Indigenous Spaces + Decolonizing Prison Abolition (Sean Swain starts at 05min, 12 sec) Ni Frontieres Ni Prisons on No New Migrant Prison in Laval, Canada (starts 12min, 08sec) Today we have a two part show! In the first part we are presenting a conversation with someone from Ni Frontiers Ni Prison, which is a group in so called Canada that is resisting the proposed construction of a new migrant prison in Laval, a town just outside of Montreal. This is a transcript of the original audio, read for the show by Grier, shout out to him! In this interview we talk about the prison and what it would mean for people who’d be most affected by it, the general rise of far right sentiment in so called Canada, and many more topics. The interviewee names the place they are based as occupied Tio'tia:ke (jo-jahg’-eh), which is the original indigenous name for so called Montreal, the colonizer name. The naming of indigenous land will continue throughout the interview with various locations in the name of decolonization, though Tio'tia:ke is the one which will be the most prominent. As an audio note to all those paying attention, a fridge turns on midway through the interview then turns back off nearing the end, we’ve tried to minimize the background noise but it’s still somewhat noticeable. Music for the intro and outro by A Tribe Called Red with Stadium Pow Wow. Contact To get in touch with this group you can email them at nifrontieresniprisons@riseup.net and for updates and further ways to get involved you can find them at facebook.com/nifrontiersniprison, or follow the link to visit the clearing house of information and pieces about this resistance. If you would like a zine copy of the transcript to this show, you can email us at thefinalstrawradio@riseup.net or thefinalstrawradio@protonmail.com. Some links to historical events mentioned by our guest relating to Canada's' treatment of immigrants and refugees: "Chinese Head Tax", a policy which "meant to discourage Chinese people from entering Canada after the completion of the Canadian Pacific Railway", a government project which I conjecture used a bunch of precarious and immigrant labor in order to complete. Komagata Maru Incident, the historic entry denial of a group of Indian refugees seeking entry into Canada on the Japanese steamship Komagata Maru in 1914, resulting in the death of 20 Sikh people at the hands of the then occupying British government. "None Is Too Many" policy for Jewish refugees fleeing the Holocaust, an anti Semitic stance that put people who were fleeing Nazi terror in further danger and possible death. Robert Free on the Daybreak Star Indian Cultural Center (starts at 38min, 04sec) Next we’ll hear an interview with Robert Free, a long-term Seattle, WA resident and Tewa (pronounced tay-oh-wa) Native American. We discuss the history of the Daybreak Star Indian Cultural Center, a cultural and resource center for urban Native Americans in Seattle and the surrounding communities. The Daybreak Star Indian Cultural Center was established after a series of protests and occupations in 1970 of Fort Lawton, an army base that had previously occupied the park. Robert Free discusses the influencing factors of that time, some of the finer points of the occupations, as well as the implications of protesting and occupation on stolen native land. More info on the Daybreak center can be found at https://unitedindians.org/daybreak-star-center/ Some of the names and events mentioned in this chat you may recognize from our February 17th, 2019, episode of The Final Straw when we had the pleasure to speak with Paulette D’auteuil, about the case of long-term American Indian Movement activist Leonard Peltier. More info on Peltier’s case can be found at whoisleonardpeltier.info   Coming Up... Next week we hope to bring you a conversation with support crew for incarcerated former military whistleblower Chelsea Manning, who is now imprisoned for refusing to testify before a Grand Jury. More on her case can be found at https://xychelsea.is including links for donating towards her fundraising goal for legal costs aiming at 150 thousand smackeroos.   Announcements Free Masonique Saunders! From her support website: On December 7, 2018, Columbus police murdered 16 year old Julius Ervin Tate Jr.. On December 13, they arrested his 16 year old girlfriend, Masonique Saunders, charging her with the murder they committed. Masonique is being charged with aggravated robbery and felony murder, and is currently being held in juvenile detention. The police have alleged that Julius attempted to rob, and pulled a gun on a police officer, and that Masonique was involved in said robbery. Felony murder means that if you commit a felony and someone dies as a result of that crime you can be charged with their murder. We believe that these charges are unjust, and demand the freedom of this 16 year old Black girl and justice for the family of Julius Tate! To help Masonique and her family, donate to her GoFundMe. Donate to the Tate family here.   BRABC events A quick reminder, if you’re in the Asheville area this coming week, Blue Ridge Anarchist Black Cross is hosting two events. On Friday, April 4th from 6:30 to 8pm at Firestorm, (as we do every first Friday of the month) BRABC will show the latest episode of Trouble, by sub.Media. Episode 19 focuses on Technology and Social Control. After the ½ hour video we’ll turn chairs around and have a discussion of the film for those who’d like. Then, on Sunday, April 6th from 5-7pm as BRABC does every first Sunday of the month, we’ll be hosting a monthly letter writing event. We’ll provide names, addresses, backstories, postage and stationary. Prisoners we’ll focus on are longterm political prisoners from Black liberation, to Earth and Animal Liberation, to anti-police violence activists caught up in prison whose birthdays are coming up or who are facing severe repression. Or, just come and write a letter you’ve been meaning to write to someone else. It’s a nice environ for that sort of thing.   Extinction Rebellion week of action The movement to halt and roll back human driven climate change called Extinction Rebellion is planning some upcoming events in the so-called U.S. in line with a worldwide call for action over the week of April 15-22nd. Check out https://extinctionrebellion.us/rebellion-week for info and ways to plug in. If you’re in the L.A. area, see our shownotes for a fedbook link to some of their upcoming events. And remember, practice good security culture by not giving up as little info as possible. Keeping your info more secure today ensures your ability to fight with less hindrance tomorrow!   Marius Mason Moved Anarchist political prisoner Marius Mason has been moved to a prison in Connecticut, a change viewed as a success by his supporters as he’s closer to family by hundreds of miles. If you’d like to write him a letter to welcome him to his new place, consider writing him at the following site, but make sure to address it as follows: Marie (Marius) Mason 04672-061 FCI DANBURY Route 37 Danbury, CT 06811   Fire at the Highlander Now, here’s a statement by the Highlander Research and Education Center outside of New Market, TN, about the fire early on March 29, 2019: “Early this morning, officials responded to a serious fire on the grounds of the Highlander Research and Education Center, one of the nation’s oldest social justice institutions that provides training and education for emerging and existing movements throughout the South, Appalachia, and the world. As of 6am, the main office building was completely engulfed and destroyed. One of ten structures on approximately 200 acres, the building housed the offices of the organization’s leadership and staff. Highlander’s staff released the following statement: “Highlander has been a movement home for nearly 87 years and has weathered many storms. This is no different. Several people were on the grounds at the time of the fire, but thankfully no one was inside the structure and no one was injured. “While we are physically unhurt, we are saddened about the loss of our main office. The fire destroyed decades of historic documents, speeches, artifacts and memorabilia from movements of all kinds, including the Civil Rights Movement. A fuller assessment of the damage will be forthcoming once we are cleared to enter the remains of the building. “We are grateful for the support of the many movements who are now showing up for us in this critical time. This has been a space for training, strategy and respite for decades and it will continue to be for decades to come. Fire officials are working to determine the cause as quickly as possible and we are monitoring the investigation closely.” --Ash-Lee Woodward Henderson and Rev. Allyn Maxfield-Steele, Co-Executive Directors, Highlander Research and Education Center. Highlander has played a critical role in the Civil Rights Movement, training and supporting the work of a number of movement activists: Rosa Parks prior to her historic role in the Montgomery Bus Boycot, members of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), Septima Clark, Anne Braden, Martin Luther King Jr., James Bevel, Hollis Watkins, Bernard Lafayette, Ralph Abernathy and John Lewis.” Highlander will provide ongoing updates via their fedbook page and questions can be directed to Chelsea Fuller, chelsea@teamblackbird.org. Police Killing of Danquirs Franklin On March 25, 2019, Charlotte-Mecklenburg police officer Wende Kerl shot and killed Danquirs Franklin in the parking lot of the Burger King on Beatties Ford Rd in Charlotte. Police narratives posit that Mr Franklin was armed and posing a threat, while eye witnesses say that Danquirs Franklin interceded against an armed man bothering an employee and that the armed man ran away before the police arrived, who then shot the first black man they encountered. Friends at Charlotte Uprising have been holding vigil and fundraising for Danquirs Franklin’s family as the police’s actions leave his child fatherless. More can be found at the Charlotte Uprising twitter and fedbook pages. Rise In Power, Danquirs. . ... . .. Show playlist.

This week we had the chance to interview Lelia, who is a community activist and a part of the group Comunidad Colectiva, an immigrant rights group based in Charlotte NC. We got to talk about a lot of things in this interview, the work that they and other groups do with immigrant and undocumented communities, about the February ICE raids that got national attention, what effective rapid response can look like, and the challenging tension associated with both being anti state and being in the position of having to negotiate with police and sheriffs for safety reasons, plus many more topics. We wanted to mention something called 287(g) and give a bit of information for listeners who may not have heard of this before. 287(g) was a contract between local officials and ICE which essentially made police forces extensions of ICE, and also instituted deportation proceedings as part of run of the mill arrests. More is explained about this contract later on in the interview, but it gets mentioned fairly heavily before that time. You can keep updated on this group’s work by hitting them up on Facebook and if you have a few dollars you’d like to throw them to recoup the costs associated with their rapid response network, their Venmo is @comunidad-colectiva. Next week on The Final Straw, stay tuned for an interview with a member of the Montreal based group Ni Frontiers Ni Prison (which is No Borders, No Prison) about fighting a proposed new migrant prison, decolonization, the rise of far right sentiment in so called Canada, and many associated topics, plus a possible other interview. Update on Kinetic Justice In a brief update to last week’s interview on the hunger strike by Kinetic Justice of the Free Alabama Movement, we’d like to share the following news. On March 20th, Kinetic Justice Amun (aka Robert Earl Council) resumed his hunger strike as he was transferred briefly to segregation housing at Limestone prison, but ended his hunger strike within a few days and was transferred to general population at that prison. He can be written at the following address: Robert Earl Council #181418 28779 Nick Davis Rd Harvest, AL 35749 Consequently, 8 of the prisoners transferred with Kinetic in the middle of the night, began engaging in a hunger strike in response to their own incarceration in solitary. In response to the hunger strike, administration cut off water to the cells they were held in, giving them bottled water. The 8 prisoners ended their hunger strike on March 22nd, and administration claims they’ll be transferred to general population in the Alabama prison system as they’re not under investigation currently. Their names are as follows: Kotoni Tellis (#223155) Marcus Lee (#175056) Mario Avila (#259514) Corey Burroughs (#207639) Earl Taylor 3rd (#168616) Tyree Cochroan (#172306) Earl Manassa (#175099) Antonio Jackson (#246560) and they can be written at: Holman “Correctional” Facitily 1240 Ross Rd. Atmore, AL 36502 . … . .. Playlist here.

End Prison Slavery: The Free Alabama Movement (Sean Swain: 4min 47sec) This week we air two interviews about the struggle of Alabama activist and prisoner Kinetic Justice. Kinetic, aka Robert Earl Council, conducted a 6 day hunger strike because he was transferred with no altercations, investigations or disciplinary actions and after just having ended an almost 54 month stint in solitary confinement as punishment for Kinetic’s activism. To hear a past interview we conducted years back with Kinetic and others of the FAM, check out this link. *** Update: 8 of the other prisoners transferred with Kinetic to solitary have just begun a hunger strike, March 18th. IWOC has begun spreading a phone zap that you can partake in to help amplify the 8 voices. *** (Swift Justice: 10min 45sec) First up, Swift Justice, a prisoner currently in the Alabama system and member of the Free Alabama Movement and founder of UnheardVoicesOTCJ. Swift talks about the Free Alabama Movement’s inside/outside work, the organizing work that prisoners, former prisoners and outside community members have done in raising awareness of the slavery system of American prisons. Swift also talks about the inspiration and struggle of Kinetic Justice and the attempt to expand the prison system in Alabama by Governor Kay Ivey with a $900 million project to build 3 super max facilities. Swift’s writings can be found at https://unheardvoicesotcj.wordpress.com/ and on his twitter @unheardvoices16 and fedbook page. (Pastor Glasgow: 35min 14sec) Then we Pastor Kenneth Sharpton Glasgow of The Ordinary Peoples Society out of Dothan, Alabama, talks about Kinetic, about the harm reduction and community empowerment projects that he’s involved in. You can learn more about the related projects at https://www.theordinarypeoplesociety.org/. And you can follow the work of the Free Alabama Movement by checking out https://freealabamamovement.org and Kinetic Justice by visiting his support blog, https://freerobertearlcouncil.wordpress.com/. . ... . .. The latest episode of BADNews can be found here: https://thefinalstrawradio.noblogs.org/post/2019/03/15/bad-news-march-2019-20/ . ... . .. Playlist

Gord Hill on Art and Resistance Gord Hill is an indigenous author, anarchist, antifascist and militant, a member of the Kwakwaka’wakw nation living in so-called British Columbia, Canada. Gord is also graphic artist and comic book author who most recently published The Antifa Comic Book, out from Arsenal Pulp Press, and runs the website Warrior Publications and sometimes publishes under the nom-de-plume of ZigZag. For the hour we speak about his writings documenting indigenous resistance history in the so-called Americas (mostly with a focus on Turtle Island), antifascist organizing, intersections of indigenous struggle and anarchism and critiques of Pacifism (see Gord’s “Smash Pacifism” zine). Some of the points of resistance that we cover include Elsipogtog (Elsipogtog in 5 Minutes video at sub.media), Idle No More, The Oka Crisis (“The Oka Crisis in 5 Minutes” video at sub.media), Stoney Point/Aazhoodena (another 5 minutes video by Gord), Gustafsen Lake (we didn’t talk about but another 5 minute video), the Zapatista Rebellion and the Unist’ot’en Camp resistance to pipelines in so-called B.C. (Sean Swain at 3min 55sec, Gord Hill at 11min 27sec, announces at 57min 29sec) Rayquan Borum Trial Update In a brief and sad update to last week’s interview on the case of Rayquan Borum, we’d like to read a statement from the fedbook page for Charlotte Uprising: We are deeply saddened to report that Rayquan Borum has been found guilty of possession of a firearm and second degree murder with him being sentenced to 25/26 years in a cage. We knew it would be difficult to receive a fair trial in the same court that allowed Officer Randall Kerrick to walk free for the murder of unarmed Jonathan Ferrell. We know the police will continue to kill Black and brown folks and escape accountability. We suffered extreme suppression from the judge from the start of the trial. Even though the medical examiner testified there was a 51% chance that ANYTHING else killed Justin Carr, Judge Hayes would not allow any testimony naming the police. Of course, it is far easier to scapegoat a random Black man than to launch an investigation into the same police force that killed ONLY Black people in 2015. We also know that Justin Carr would be alive were it not for the Charlotte Mecklenburg Police Department murder of Keith Lamont Scott (no trial for that officer, of course). We know that the Mecklenburg County Courts disproportionately sentence Black and brown bodies to time in cages. We know that CMPD disproportionately arrests Black and brown folks. Black people are 30% of Charlotte’s population and make up about 70% of the jail population. Heinous. We know that this is the American Way. In response, we will continue to rise up and resist this colonized nation and work toward building a more decolonized world, for all of us. Forward, together #CMPDKilledJustinCarr #CagesFixNothing #FreeThemAll #CMPD #RayquanBorum #MecklenburgCounty #NoMoreKIllerCopsOrJails Announcements A few house keeping notes about the show. We’re happy to announce that The Final Straw is now available on the Pacifica Radio platform for affiliate stations to pick up more easily. If you, dear listener, live in an area where we aren’t on the radio but there’s a community station that airs programming from the Pacifica Network, you now have a WAY easier IN to bug the station’s programming director with. If you want us on your airwaves, check out our “broadcasting” tab on our website and reach out to a local radio station. If you have questions or want help, reach out to us and we’re happy to chat. We hope to have a some more terrestrial broadcast stations to announce soon. Actually, yah, that was the only note. Tee hee. Otherwise, if you want to hear Bursts dj’ing a 2 hour set of punk, goth and electronica on AshevilleFM, an archive is linked up in our show notes that’s available until March 12th.   Asheville Events If you’re in the Asheville area, there’re a few events coming up on March 16th of note. At 11am at Firestorm books, a participant in the Internationalist Commune, a self-organized collective in Northern Syria, will join us for a video chat about the revolutionary movement to transform Kurdish territory into a stateless society. Later, across town, there’re a couple of Blue Ridge ABC events at Static Age on Saturday, March 16th. From 3-5pm there’ll be an N64 Super Smash Brothers tournament with vegan philly cheese steaks and fries available, and then from 9pm onward an antifascist black metal show featuring Arid from Chicago, plus local bands Rat Broth and Feminazgul. Then, a reminder, that on March 22nd at the Block Off Biltmore is a benefit for info-sharing between Southern Appalachia and Rojava. The event will include a discussion, a short documentary showing, vegan desserts and nice merchandise. For more info, check out the flyer in our shownotes from March 3rd, 2019. And now a couple of prisoner announcements Chelsea Manning Imprisoned U.S. Army whistleblower and former Political Prisoner, Chelsae Manning, has been jailed for criminal contempt for refusing a subpoena to participate in a Federal Grand Jury in Virginia concerning her 2010 disclosures to Wikileaks of U.S. drone killings of civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan. A support committee called “Chelsea Resists!” has been set up and updates will be coming from the website xychelsea.is and there’s a fundraiser up at actionnetwork.com for her as well. We hope to feature members of her support as well as former Grand Jury resisters who’ve been on this show before in an episode soon. You can write to Chelsea at the following address: Chelsea Elizabeth Manning AO181426 William G. Trusdale Adult Detention Center 2001 Mill Road Alexandria, VA 22314 Some quick guidelines to keep her safer while writing are in the show notes Address your letter exactly as shown above send letters on white paper use the mail service to send letters include color drawings if you’d like sparingly send 4x6 photos, as she may only keep 10 at a time Do not send cards, packages, postcards, photocopies or cash Do not decorate the outside of the envelope do not send books or magazines Exonerated Vaughn 17 prisoners transferred out of state As the cases proceed against the Vaughn17, 17 prisoners on trial in Delaware for a prison uprising following the election of Trump as president, an uprising sometimes compared to the Lucasville Uprising, repression continues. The uprising was as follows: prisoners took over Building C at the Vaughn prison in Smyrna, Delaware, and took three prison guards and one prison counselor hostage. Demands issued during the hostage standoff included that Delaware Governor John Carney investigate poor living conditions at the facility. One correctional officer who was taken hostage, Steven Floyd, would later be found dead after police re-entered the facility. The case can be followed at vaughn17support.org as it enters it’s third trial group. A few words from the support site note the continued repression of some of the court-exonerated prisoners: The State of Delaware retaliated against defendants in the Vaughn uprising trial last week, by moving them out of state to Pennsylvania. Kevin Berry, Abednego Baynes, Obadiah Miller, Johnny Bramble, Dwayne Staats, and Jarreau Ayers were all transferred to solitary confinement at SCI Camp Hill, a maximum security facility. They joined Deric Forney, who was transferred weeks earlier in January. Berry, Baynes, and Forney have all been fully acquitted on all charges. “It’s unusual to move prisoners with short terms left in their sentence out of state,” said Fariha Huriya, an organizer working closely with Vaughn 17 prisoners. “They’re being held in solitary confinement, with no showers, no access to commissary, and limited phone calls. It’s the same inhumane conditions that they faced at James T. Vaughn.” “The State’s vindictiveness will cost them,” said Betty Rothstein, who also organizes with the prisoners. “The Vaughn 17 have resisted these charges, and will continue to resist and expose the corruption of the DOC and abuse on prisoners.” There are nine defendants who are still awaiting trial. New trial dates for groups 3 and 4 are scheduled for May 6th, 2019, and October 21st, 2019. . ... . .. Playlist

Anarchists In Conflict: Rojava + Yellow Vest Movement (Sean Swain at 6:28, interviews begin at 14:05) This week on The Final Straw, the episode’s theme is anarchist interventions in struggles around the world. We’ll be sharing audios from comrades in the A-Radio Network, which just had it’s 5th Annual Gathering in Zurich, Switzerland. The A-Radio Network is made up of stations around Europe, plus a smattering in South + North America. We have been a member of the ARN for 4 years now, which over the last year and a half produces the monthly B(A)DNews: Angry Voices From Around The World news podcast in English, made up of contributions by A-Radio member-projects. You can find past episodes at our website. In lieu of this month’s BADNews, the gathering produced an 8 hour radio show last week and elements of this broadcast. We’ll present here two interviews from that broadcast concerning the struggle for autonomy in the social revolutionary region of Rojava, in northern Syria. The first is with a fighter with the Tekosina Anarsist (Anarchist Struggle, starts at 42:49) and the second with Zaher Baher, a member of the Kurdish Anarchist Forum in London (starts at 57:04). well as one from another an interview conducted a week ago with an anarchist in Paris, France, involved with the Yellow Vest (Gilets jaunes) social movement in France for some updates and perspectives. But first, we’ll be airing audio from another member of the A-Radio as well as Channel Zero Network projects, Dissident Island Radio from London in the U.K., with an interview about the geopolitics of Rojava and leadership within the Kurdish struggle with a comrade participating in the annual ‘Long March‘ in solidarity with Abdullah Öcalan (starts at 14:05). We apologize for the audio quality. We invite you to note the differences of opinion between the anarchists who’ve witnessed, lived in, or fought for the Rojava Revolution, as somewhere within and between their perspectives I believe lies some of the truth of the complex situation there. Announcements Happy Birthday Yona Unega (Oso Blanco) From occupied Cherokee territory in so-called western North Carolina, we’d like to wish a happy birthday on February 26th to wolf clan Cherokee/Choctaw political prisoner, Oso Blanco or, in Cherokee, Yona Unega. Oso is in for armed robberies, where he expropriated from U.S. banks and sent funds to Zapatistas communities in the Yucatan in Mexico. You can write to Oso to write him a happy birthday by addressing letters to his state name: Byron Chubbuck #07909051 USP Victorville PO BOX 3900 Adelanto, CA 92301 And more info on Yona Unega’s case and efforts can be found at https://freeosoblanco.blogspot.com Blue Ridge ABC events Friday, March 1st is the first Friday of the month and therefore the Trouble Showing at Firestorm Books and Coffee in Asheville, NC. Episode 18, entitled ACAB (for All Cops Are Bastards) airs at 6:30pm and will be followed by a little over an hour of discussion. Then, on Sunday March 3rd, as the 1st Sunday of the month, BRABC will hold it’s Political Prisoner letter writing event, again at Firestorm. The event begins at 5pm, letter writing materials including stamps, prisoners names and stories, addresses and help in writing. If you’ve never written someone a letter or someone in prison in particular, no worries. It’s a nice social time. The event runs from 5pm to 7:30pm. Finally, on Saturday, March 16th, Blue Ridge ABC is holding a double-header at Static Age Records in downtown Asheville. First up, from 3-5pm, a Super Smash Brothers benefit tournament, with vegan cheese-steaks and fries available. Double elimination, best 2 out of 3 rounds. For more info, check out https://www.smashprisonssmashbros.eventbrite.com. Then, from 9pm til late at Static Age, get ready for a lineup of anti-fascist metal including Rat Broth, Arid, and Margaret Killjoy’s project Feminazgul, plus more to be announced. More on all of these events can be found at brabc.blackblogs.org . ... . .. Playlist

A Story of Leonard Peltier This week, Paulette D'auteuil speaks about the life and case of Leonard Peltier. Peltier is one of the best known political prisoners currently held in the U.S. Paulette is the Director of the International Leonard Peltier Defense Committee, based near Coleman, FL, where Leonard is incarcerated and also is an advisor to the National Jericho Movement. For the hour, Paulette tells about Leonard's life, his case, his health, the resistance that Leonard was and continues to be a part of, COINTELPRO, and Leonard's art. You can learn more about Leonard Peltier by visiting the ILPDC's website, http://whoisleonardpeltier.info, where you'll find lots more info, Leonard's artwork, ways to plug in and do events to raise awareness of Leonard's case and keep up on updates. You can also find the ILPDC on twitter and fedbook. Interview begins at 9 min, 14 sec . ... . .. playlist

This week, we feature two segments on the show: an interview with a Russian anarchist about the recent ramping up of torture and repression by the FSB in Russia against anarchists and anti-fascists  (00:14:13); and a chat with Patrick Strickland, author of "Alerta! Alerta!: Snapshots of Europe’s Anti-Fascist Struggle” (00:34:17); plus anarchist prisoner Sean Swain on his bid to "Build The Wall" (00:08:27) FSB Torture of Radicals First up, Bursts spoke with Tania, a Russian anarchist, a member of the crew who runs the RUpression website documenting Russian state agencies like the FSB's use of torture to extract stories to build conspiracies to legitimize their tightening of restrictions on public gatherings, chill the political and media landscape, and sustain a state of sense of fear among the populace. We discuss the death of Mikhail Zhlobitsky in a bombing of an FSB office in October, the current state of anarchist organizing in Russia, and the past political repression since 2012 and the cases in Pensa and the 2017 "The Network" conspiracy case (which we've spoken of in this show in the past here and here). In February 2019, a situation unfolded where Azat Miftakhov disappeared, came back tortured, and accused of taking part in an anarchist terrorist plot. Azat was released by court order only to be re-arrested by another police agency (well documented in this crimethInc article, alongside some downloadable posters for pasting around your town). You can learn more about the case by reading and following rupression.com Patrick Strickland on European Anti-Fascism Secondly, William had the chance to interview Patrick Strickland, who is a journalist and author, about his recently released book "Alerta! Alerta! Snapshots of Europe's Anti-Fascist Struggle". This book follows the stories and lives of 5 European people who do broadly defined antifascist work or struggle. For this interview we talk about Strickland's journalism, the experiences of compiling this book, and about understanding elements on the far right that might enhance antifascism, in the so called US, Europe, and elsewhere. Follow him on Twitter @P_Strickland_ for news and upcoming projects! Announcements Show Up For Rayquan Borum! If you are in Charlotte NC tomorrow, Monday the 11th, consider showing up to support Rayquan Borum, who is a Black activist arrested during the Charlotte Uprising, a days long protest to mourn and rage against the police murder of Keith Lamont Scott in 2016. From charlotteuprising.com/statement : "The uprising in Charlotte is a direct response to sustained police and vigilante violence against Black people in this city and across the country: Keith Lamont Scott, Jonathan Ferrell, Aiyana Stanley, Jones, Tyre King, Korryn Gaines, Janisha Fonville, Terence Crutcher and so many more. These are names of victims we know and deeply mourn, understanding there are so many other people who have been unnecessarily taken from us." The arrest of Rayquan Borum was a direct attempt by police to frame Mr. Borum, and he is finally going to trial after 2 years being held in and out of solitary confinement. The trial will be held starts February 11th, and will start at 9:30am in room 5370 at the address 832 East Fourth Street Charlotte, NC, which is the Mecklenburg County Courthouse. You can follow the Charlotte Uprising on twitter, facebook, and tumblr for more ways to get involved and support the folks facing ongoing repression from the Uprising. And here is a link to a useful court support quicksheet made specifically for this trial! Court solidarity needs for Rayquan are ongoing, so plug in when you can. Federal Prison Postal Changes Survey Lawyers & activists doing prisoner support have been concerned with new Federal Bureau of Prisons' rules limiting the type of mail people in prison can receive -- for example, rules that people in federal prison can only get white paper / envelopes, and no cards or drawings.   There is work being done to look into what is going on across the country on this issue. If you have heard anything, they'd love to hear about it.  They are also trying to collect evidence of what is happening at all the different federal facilities.  If you have any of the following (or if you feel comfortable asking for any of these types of things from people in prison you are in contact with), that would be super helpful, including:    Any memos from federal prisons detailing new mail restrictions Any program statements from BoP detailing new mail restrictions Any Institutional Supplements from BoP detailing new mail restrictions Scans of federal mail rejections based on new restrictions (color of letter, color of envelope, use of mailing label, greeting card etc) Scans of envelopes with rejected stickers detailing reason for rejection Scans of grievances from prisoners regarding the mail restrictions If you are interested in potentially working with us around this issue, let the folks at Certain Days Calendar know, and they can reach out with info about their next meeting. Get in touch at: info@certaindays.org Free Tibet celebration in Scotland and around the world If you're listening in Edinburgh, Scotland, there'll be a March on Sunday March 10 from The Mound in support of 60th anniversary of the Tibetan Uprising to the invasion and occupation by the Chinese communist regime forces. On the subject of resistance and the Tibetan Diaspora, there'll be guest speakers making speeches and then a march to Scottish Parliament at Holyrood. TBA there may be a film screening afterwards. The event is scheduled from 12-2pm UTC More can be found on fedbook by searching "Tibetan Community in Scotland". . ... . .. Playlist